The Sizzle in Algeciras

Don't believe all the guide books tell you

Ever since I first landed in Spain, my career has been ‘going south’ – and I don’t just mean geographically.

Because after alluring Alicante and magnificent Málaga, also-ran Algeciras seems a bit of a comedown for a freelance writer specialising in ‘sizzle’ .

I mean, you never read about Hemingway’s Algeciras. You couldn’t do a lot of Driving Over Lemons in Algeciras. Orwell paid no homage to Algeciras (as he did to Catalonia), Gerald Brenan never got this far South from Granada and, although the poet Lorca once stayed in Algeciras, it didn’t inspire him to wax lyrical.

‘spewing out smoke and pollution in the direction of The Rock’ Rough Guides

But I needed some new leggings and it has a Zara (so not too Third World, then) and I have a moneybelt … So I strapped it on and set forth.

And guess what?

I didn’t get mugged, I wasn’t offered drugs and the wind must have been blowing the pollution in a different direction on the sun-filled autumnal day I sat in Plaza Alta, contemplating the ceramic toad fountain over a café con leche.

It’s fashionable to knock Algeciras but I’m no fashionista (except where Zara leggings are concerned). The quintessential Cinderella city whose ball-going days were Once Upon A Time must have been beautiful once (a phrase I can personally relate to). How could the first city ever built by the Moors in Spain not have been beautiful, once?

(And I didn’t read that in the guide books…)

Now she’s just another old lady in need of a facelift, still impeccably connected – to Morocco and Ceuta by ferry, to Gibraltar by road and to the rest of Europe by train – but people don’t stay, they pass through. She’s no more than a one-night stand.

Poor old Algeciras, dismissed by all and sundry as a transport hub!

Of course, this is not Gaudí’s Barcelona or Villanueva’s Madrid. It’s Eduardo Torroja’s Algeciras. Torroja was a Madrid structural engineer famous for pioneering the ‘concrete shell’.

There’s a lot of concrete in Algeciras and some of it is shabby. But there’s nothing too shabby about the roof of Algeciras Market Hall, engineered by Torroja in 1933 and the largest in the world until the Houston Astro Dome stole the title. The architect of the city’s Kursaal Conference Centre in Algeciras should also take a bow for his ‘concrete chic’. That’s Guillermo Pérez Villalta, a brilliant post-modernist artist who has paintings hanging in Madrid’s Reina Sofía Museum.

(And I didn’t read that in the guide books…)

For better or worse, Algeciras and I are stuck with each other like star-crossed lovers: a writer specialising in sizzle and a city that no one wants to credit with having any.

So what the hell! I’ll write my own guide book and give it a working title: The Sizzle in Algeciras.

If it isn’t an oxymoron then it could be a best seller!

IMAGE GALLERY (Hover to read the caption, double click to enlarge the pictures)

5 REASONS TO LOVE ALGECIRAS

(double click to enlarge the pictures)

1. Paco de Lucía, the great classical flamenco guitarist, loves his native Algeciras – as do all these Spanish artists and celebrities who were also born in the city and agreed to share the love (for no fee) in the following video, produced by Algeciras Town Hall. The Algeciras me gusta campaign also has its own Facebook page.

2. Ava Gardner, Orson Wells, Lorca, Cole Porter, Franklin D. Roosevelt and a young journalist called Winston Churchill all signed the visitors book at the Reina Cristina, said to be the oldest hotel on the southern Spanish coast. This atmospheric establishment set in 50.000 m2 of manicured gardens overlooking the Bay of Algeciras exudes Hercule Poirotesque elegance. Its colonial charms may be a little worn but it’s still the perfect setting for cocktails on a sultry summer’s evening.

Retro romance: the grand Hotel Reina Cristina

3. You can catch the Smugglers Express from Algeciras. The line now plied by the high-speed Altaria to Madrid has its origins in the late 19th century, when it was built to provide British garrison officers in Gibraltar with family away-days in the Spanish countryside. It earned its nickname because it travelled so slowly, people were able to sell contraband liquor, coffee and sugar through the windows. It’s also called Mr Henderson’s Railway after Sir Alexander Henderson, the English railway enthusiast who backed the project and built a hotel at each end of the line – the aforementioned Reina Cristina and its sister, the Reina Victoria, in Ronda. Even today, this scenic train is the only way to travel to Ronda, running through countryside so stunning that it’s going to merit a post of its own. Watch this space!

Catch the Smugglers Express from Algeciras

4. The Moroccan Quarter in Algeciras has all of the advantages (and none of the alcoholic deprivations) of the real Africa, whose rugged contours rise up across the Gibraltar Strait. Scores of ferry companies are clustered here, at the south-western end of the city where the flavour of everything merges to Mudejar. Look out for kebab kiosks, colourful cake shops selling cloud-light puff pastry pastelas and teterías serving mint tea.

A taste of Morocco in Algeciras

5. Remember the old Otis Redding song, Sitting on the Dock of the Bay? You can do that in Algeciras, the strategically important gateway to the Atlantic and Mediterranean and the 16th busiest port in the world. Some 3million containers a year are loaded and unloaded from its 10 kilometres of quays. Watching the ships roll in beats staring at beaches of under-clad, over-fed bodies any time!

Check out this mind-blowing time lapse video with amazing speeded-up footage of port activity and other aspects of the Campo de Gibraltar. Shared by kind permission of ANLOES100 who made his video using a Panasonic FZ100, 16 time lapse films and 13,000 photographs. Prepare to be amazed!

A History in Pictures

STOP PRESS: Since this post was published it attracted the attention of Europa Sur, the daily newspaper for the Campo de Gibraltar. They couldn’t quite believe a foreigner had nice words to say about Algeciras! This is the interview they published about it on 13/12/2012.

Belinda

Belinda Beckett shares perspectives from both sides of the Spain-Gibraltar border. A qualified journalist & freelance writer living in the Campo de Gibraltar, Andalucía, she specialises in travel/lifestyle features, humour columns, business writing and website copy writing with wow factor. Find Belinda on Google+

65 Comments

You did a magnificent job encouraging me to go back but I guess a bit like Poland and Hungary there is always/there has always been somewhere “more interesting” to go ……and it sure as houses isn’t Gibraltar.

OK, I promise. Next time I am down that way I shall drop in to see whether it is any better than the last time I was there!

Great info about much maligned Algeciras. I have been there many moons ago to cross over to Morocco and I was offered drugs but had tapas out and had a nice meal. The place had a nice feel to it. Like all ports it had its dodgy side but so does Valencia!

I didn’t know that the magnificent Paco de Lucía was from Algeciras… a definite reason to visit!

Also interesting to see you quote from Guidebooks. I often think many travel guides both on and off the net are written by people who haven’t been their basing ther writing on previous misinformed articles. It’s kind of a mad Chinese whispers.

Agree Simon and the future travel writers will be the people who live in the area, not the pampered press who go there on jollies and see everything through booze-tinted spectacles. The local writers know it inside out (like you in Barcelona) and have up-to-date info and photos (most tourist boards have a poor offering if they have any at all)!

Oh, I’d love to believe you but when you see one incorrect piece of information (train link Alicante-Torrevieja-Cartagena) trotted out as often as politicians’ promises then you know D copied C who copied B who had copied A who read it in an expat magazine which had Google translated something from a party political brochure.

Lovely article, Belinda. Can’t remember much at all about Algeciras as I only caught the ferry there to Morocco. But your article has inspired me to return; to see the city for itself rather than as a port terminal.

Excellent article, Belinda, thanks! I’m totally ignorant about Algericas, only believing what I’ve read in guidebooks, or hear from Spanish friends who comes from there – who aren’t entirely complimentary about the city! That hotel sounds especially interesting. I was just reading about the Henderson railway, fascinating stuff!

Well Jim, I think that some of the photos you see here prove that a camera can be handy. And poor old Huelva, that’s a lot of square kilometres you’ve dismissed, I’ll have to go and check it out and see if I can’t find some sizzle somewhere!

Great article Belinda! I agree, Algeciras is nowhere near as bad as people make out.

One great writer who agrees with you is Laurie Lee in his autobiographical book ‘As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning’ where he takes a ship to Vigo and basically walks the length and breadth of Spain, busking. He didn’t like Seville or Cadiz at all but fell in love with Algeciras, of all places. He said he wouldn’t mind staying there.

He also described Gibraltar as looking as if ‘it had been towed out from Portsmouth and anchored off-shore still wearing its own grey roof of weather’. LOL.

I’ve got to applaud you for this! After living there the last 3 years, I’ve come away with only a select good things to say about Algeciras. It’s definitely not a place I ever want to return to, but it goes to show you can always find the good in things if you try hard enough!

Congratulations Belinda!! I loved your article. It’s quite hard to read or hear good reviews about Algeciras, even from Spanish people or TV. I’m from Algeciras, actually living in London, and only wanted to add that I’ve been offered drugs more times here in 2 years than there in 25.

Hi Belinda, your article is so nice and so true!!!
Well, I was born in Algeciras, to be honest… But anyway I have been living in other cities, I have traveled abroad quite a lot, and I realize how nice is to live here, in Algeciras.
Have you visit “Faro de Punta Carnero”?? I heartily recommend it !!!
Kind regards,
Carlos

Algeciras is a very beautiful city. Most people who pass through it aren´t aware of all its charms, perhaps by careless tourism orientation. But the great fault is that people who pass through our city’s prejudice it only with the walk from the bus station or train to the ferry. There’s much more to it than that, we have a lot of wonderful places to show. Although it’s a city with 140,000 residents approximately, the people of Algeciras are as welcoming and neighbourly as in any of the small villages.

Belinda – thanks for introducing me to this city! I made it to the south of Spain, but not the SE part.

I believe it’s possible to find something interesting in every destination (but I think you know that, given that you saw my Tijuana post 🙂 ).

One of my favorite cities to visit is… Detroit, the place that everyone seems to hate and has written off. But that’s probably because they don’t know about their home brews, a few gourmet restaurants, outdoor market, and an amazing jazz club that’s only open 1 day a week and only locals and cabbies know about…

Algericas in your description seems like a place I’d put on my list and probably enjoy, starting with flamenco performances. As a marketer, I also appreciate the ‘Algericas me gusta” campaign. When I started reading your post, I was wondering if something like that was in place.

Thanks Pola, I’ll have to check out your Detroit (got a helluva hockey team is all I know – according to Simon & Garfunkel). I agree, Algeciras would be a great starting point for appreciating traditional flamenco, rather than the usual tourist rubbish!

Good and interesting article.
Laurie Lee writes affectionately about it not only in “As I walked Out One Midsummer Morning” which was pre civil war c1936 (he was rescued by a British gunship) but again in “A Rose for Winter”, a post civil war revisit to Spain c1951.
His writing is so beautifully descriptive, affectionate and evocative that I want to visit and see for myself although I expect it’s all changed now.

Hi Mindy, I’m sure you can. If you have transport, Anne Manson runs a cookery school that’s very highly regarded in the beautiful village of Vejer, about an hour or less from Algeciras, you can find details http://www.anniebspain.com If you contact her, send her my best!

Thanks for getting back to me Belinda. A friend of mine lives in Algeciras and she’s invited me to stay for a while. If I decide to take her up in her kind offer I will definitely find out more about that cookery school. And of course I will send her your best.

Oh and thanks for giving me a bird’s eye view of the city. I rather like the fact that you have to search for the best bits rather than having them handed to you on a plate! I have lived in Rome, Verona and Borneo, so I have had best bits hurled at me from every direction. Not complaining though.

Awesome blog! Do you have any tips and hints for aspiring
writers? I’m planning to start my own blog soon but I’m a little lost on everything.
Would you propose starting with a free platform like WordPress or go for a
paid option? There are so many options out there that I’m completely confused ..
Any ideas? Cheers!

Hi Agustin
Definitely use WordPress but ultimately it’s worth paying for a decent theme and I got a designer to help me – there’s a link direct to his site at the bottom of my home page. You could always download a free one to start with and play around with it, then you’ll have more idea of what you want and don’t want.

Belinda,
I live in Algeciras and I would like to show you more of this unknown corner of the world where there is much history in every place where you spend and often know not transmit.
You have my email, if you come back write me.

You have ‘hit the nail on the head’ as we British say, Jésus. The Bay of Algeciras Bay had the potnetial to be as beautiful as Sydney Harbour, with a little forethought, but the port also provides work – although maybe not as much work as tourism could have offered. But it’s still fun looking for the brilliance in this rough diamond! I loved what you have written so I ran it here in full.

So appreciated, Salvador :-). I’m still only taking baby steps so please spread the word and sign up for the Sizzle on the Home Page to get notified of new posts and reader offers (like my FREE Algeciras-to-Ronda Mr Henderson’s Railway Trip Planner)!

My parents discovered this place stayng at the Reina Christina in the 60’s and bought a flat there that has been in the family ever since. We come here every summer. Why?
There are no tourists
It is a proper spanish town
The square is so typically spanish and there is enough shopping
If you know where to go in the strets behind the square there are good restaurents
The local beaches have white sand and warm sea unlike the Costa del sol – black sand and Tarifa’s wind.
Hopefully the Tourists will not come here as we like it just the way it is – Real Spain.

Yes, there are many hidden culinary gems in the back streets behind the plaza and it’s fun hunting them out. One of my favourites is Entre Tejas in Calle Baílen (Dancing Street!) – the carillada is formidable!

Thank you for your blog. We arrived yesterday for a week at Reina Cristina after booking without checking the locality. After reading so many negative comments it was great to read your blog. Yesterday we walked into town and were surprised that it was rather nice and we just returned from a visit to Entre Tejas – dispite fogetting our food guide and speaking no Spanish the waitress helped us and we had good tapas.

Plaza Alta in the sunshine is a lovely spot to drink coffee and it’s usually good in Spain. Another favourite place is the rooftop cafe at El Corte Inglés department store, as the views are terrific. They have glass curtains so you can enjoy the sunshine inside on chillier days. Also don’t forget to try mint tea and pastries in the Moroccan quarter. This weekend, watch out for the possibility of special memorial events to celebrate the great flamenco artist Paco de Lucia who sadly died this last week of February 2014. RIP to this best-loved son of Algeciras.

Appreciating the time and energy you put into your
website and detailed information you present. It’s good to come across a blog every once
in a while that isn’t the same unwanted rehashed material.
Fantastic read! I’ve bookmarked your site and I’m adding your RSS
feeds to my Google account.

Thank you Vera, that’s very gratifying to know! If you sign up for my newsletter on the Home Page you get a free Mr Henderson’s Railway trip planer showing you how to travel this scenic British Victorian railroad under your own steam.

Hi Marion. You can get new posts delivered freshly to your mailbox (once or twice a month) – just sign up on the Home Page – AND you get a free copy of my guide to Andalucía’s most secret scenic railway!

Came across your blog when looking up Carteia which my husband used to scramble over as a boy. Glad to read some positive information on the Campo de Gibraltar it still has so much to offer if you know where to look and you are doing a great job in talking the time and effort to spread the word.

You’re so awesome! I don’t believe I have read something like this before.

So good to find another person with a few unique thoughts on this
issue. Seriously.. thanks for starting this up. This
site is something that is required on the internet, someone
with a little originality!